March 19, 2024

Supino files lawsuit against Jacobsen, Halferty

A woman acquitted in 2015 of the 34-year-old murders of her estranged husband and his girlfriend at the former Copper Dollar Ranch in Newton has filed a defamation suit against the prosecuting attorney and Jasper County Sheriff.

An attorney for Theresa “Terri” Supino filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Des Moines Tuesday against Jasper County Attorney Mike Jacobsen and sheriff John Halferty, claiming they caused irreparable damage to Supino’s reputation and violated her constitutional right to due process with her 2014 arrest and subsequent double murder trial.

Supino became the primary suspect of the March 3, 1983 beating deaths of 20-year-old Steven Fisher and 17-year-old Melisa Gregory when Halferty reopened the cold case investigation in 2012. Their bodies were found in a trailer at the former Copper Dollar Ranch northwest of Newton.

Supino was acquitted by a jury in Black Hawk County in 2015 following a three-week trial. Her attorneys at the time argued there was no physical evidence such as DNA or fingerprints tying Supino to the murders, although she admitted to driving to the ranch with her brother looking for Fisher the night before the bodies were discovered.

Supino was charged with two counts of first-degree murder March 3, 2014, the 31st anniversary of the murder, and spent the next year in jail awaiting trial.

In the initial complaint filed Tuesday, Supino’s attorney Bruce H. Stoltze Jr. claims his client was denied due process in the murder case and did not have the resources to deny statements of implied guilt, which were brought forward in witness testimony during the trial.

Stoltze also accused Jacobsen and Halferty of false statements to the press during the course of the trial.

"The statements were of a kind that would reasonably be understood to attack the
Plaintiff's (Supino) moral character and integrity; expose the Plaintiff to public hatred, contempt or
ridicule; and deprive the Plaintiff of the benefits of public confidence and social dealings," the complaint states.

Federal court documents show Supino is asking for $500,000 in damages in the defamation suit.

To aid in reopening the cold case, Halferty brought in outside investigators from the TNT television show “Cold Justice.” The sheriff said the program could provide investigative tools not at his disposal. The involvement of “Cold Justice” became a controversial topic during Supino’s trial.

Immediately following the verdict, Supino spoke with reporters in the courtroom, stating she believed her arrest was a device to get the “Cold Justice” episode to air and that she intended to file a lawsuit.

“They wouldn’t air the show unless they had someone in custody, and that somebody was me,” she said. “Even now I’m not done. I’m going to sue somebody.”

No one from “Cold Justice” was named as a party in the lawsuit filed in Des Moines.

Jacobsen and Halferty did not immediately return phone calls on Wednesday, but told the Newton Daily News following the trial they did not expect to file any additional charges in the 34-year-old murders.

Contact Mike Mendenhall at mmendenhall@newtondailynews.com